Italy's Olympic medalists plead with Rome mayor on 2024 bid

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Rome's 5-Star Movement Mayor Virginia Raggi, center, attends a ceremony for the 73rd anniversary of an Italian defense of Rome by Nazi occupation, in Rome, Thursday, Sept. 8, 2016. The leader of Italy's populist 5-Star Movement Beppe Grillo has given Rome's embattled mayor a public vote of confidence after her administration fell into disarray over a spate of resignations. (Massimo Percossi/ANSA via AP)

Rome's 5-Star Movement Mayor Virginia Raggi attends a ceremony for the 73rd anniversary of an Italian defense of Rome by Nazi occupation, in Rome, Thursday, Sept. 8, 2016. The leader of Italy's populist 5-Star Movement Beppe Grillo has given Rome's embattled mayor a public vote of confidence after her administration fell into disarray over a spate of resignations. (Massimo Percossi/ANSA via AP)

ROME (AP) — Italian medalists from the Rio de Janeiro Olympics wrote to Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi on Thursday pleading with her not to drop the capital's bid for the 2024 Games, saying it would be a mistake to "close the door on a unique opportunity."

Raggi has voiced opposition to the bid but has not formally rejected it. She is scheduled to meet with Italian Olympic Committee President Giovanni Malago this month.

Rome, one of four candidates in the international bid race, is trying to bring the Summer Olympics back to Italy for the first time since the city hosted the 1960 Games.

"Those of us who had the opportunity to experience the Rio Games and to win a medal, putting Italy's name on the podium, are convinced that bringing the games back to our country and our capital would give future generations the necessary optimism to believe in a better future," said the letter, signed by the 68 athletes. "You can give a decisive push to our dreams and a reason for enthusiasm for all Italian sport."

Raggi, who represents the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, became Rome's first female mayor in June and, at age 37, also its youngest.

She maintained throughout her campaign that she wants to focus on "everyday items before extraordinary ones" and has pointed to the high costs faced by Olympic cities.

IOC guidelines for bid cities require undivided support from the city, the national Olympic committee and the government.

"We ask you not to leave out your support for Rome's bid," the letter said. "We ask you with the passion we have shown recently in our competitions and which allowed us to excel. We appeal to your sensitivity as a mayor and your love as a mother.

"If we play together no match can ever be lost. United we can win. You showed that by becoming mayor. We showed that by winning in Rio. We are certain you share our sentiments. Don't close the door on a unique opportunity."

Previous Rome Mayor Ignazio Marino formally submitted the bid to the International Olympic Committee last year after a city council vote showed overwhelming support.

The other 2024 bidders are Los Angeles, Paris and Budapest, Hungary. The IOC will select the host city in September 2017.

If the bid is rejected, it would mark Rome's second withdrawal in four years after then-premier Mario Monti in 2012 stopped Rome's bid for the 2020 Games for financial reasons.

"Rome is our capital and we are all by your side in the battle you are leading to get it back to ancient glories," the athletes said in their letter to Raggi. "We would be happy to be able to compete now, together, to achieve a dream, a hope: Rome 2024. A sporting embrace."

WASHINGTON (AP) — Relatives of Jesse Owens and America's 17 other black athletes from the 1936 Olympics were welcomed to the White House on Thursday by President Barack Obama for the acknowledgement they didn't receive along with their white counterparts 80 years ago.

Along with the relatives of the 1936 African-American Olympians, gloved-fist protesters Tommie Smith and John Carlos and members of the 2016 U.S. Olympic and Paralympic teams met the president and first lady Michelle Obama. Obama congratulated the Rio athletes, thanked Smith and Carlos for waking up Americans in 1968 and praised 1936 Olympians who made a statement in front of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany.

TOKYO (AP) — An expert panel set up by Tokyo's newly elected governor says the price tag of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics could exceed $30 billion unless drastic cost-cutting measures are taken. That's more than a four-fold increase from the initial estimate at the time Tokyo was awarded the games in 2013.